Fall 2002

At this writing, the general election campaign for governor has just gotten underway, and it’s looking like a barn-burner. And with the first post-primary poll putting the race at a statistical tie, it’s going to be quite a sprint to the finish. But it’s not too early to be disappointed by the election of 2002,(...)

Shays’s Rebellion: The American Revolution’s Final BattleBy Leonard R. RichardsUniversity of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 216 pages. Residents of western Massachusetts find it difficult to avoid regular encounters with the legacy of Daniel Shays. When I drive my youngest son to school, we cut diagonally across South Amherst on Shays Street. When I take visitors on(...)

Who stands for Massachusetts–Frasier or Spenser? Visions of conventioneers–and not Shriners in fezzes–are dancing in Boston heads. Mayor Thomas Menino wants to host the Democratic Party’s national convention in 2004, and he’s put together an impressively united front of civic and business leaders to make the city’s case. His argument is simple and compelling: With(...)

When Massachusetts voters choose a governor on November 5, they’re more likely to be thinking about, say, tolls on the Turnpike than the balance of power in Washington, DC. But they might want to pause a moment to consider the question of party labels and power politics on the national level. After all, if Mitt(...)

At the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Thomas E. Patterson is something of a rare breed: a political scientist. The Shorenstein Center, even more than the Kennedy School itself, is as much a practitioner’s retreat from Spin City as it is a haven for(...)

ADAMS — Hard times and failed dreams aren’t new in the North Berkshire town of Adams. Since 1940, the picturesque hamlet has lost nearly one-third of its population as its paper and textile mills have moved out or closed, leaving Adams without an economic base. But the state government has tried to help the town(...)

Contrary to Sam Tyler’s opinion, institutions that offer advanced educational degrees that qualify police personnel for salary upgrades have not stood still for the 30-plus years the Quinn Bill has been in place. Much like police-recruit training, these college programs no longer focus strictly on criminal justice subjects. They cover a much broader base, including(...)

When they go to the polls this November, two-thirds of Massachusetts voters will see only one candidate for state representative on the ballot. Only South Carolina has less competition for seats in the lower legislativebody, the one designed to be closest to the people. Massachusetts also stands out in potential for a par-tisan reversal of(...)

The theory sounds good: Better-educated police officers make for better policing, and that’s something worth paying for. But what if there are no standards to ensure that the quality of instruction delivered to police officers and the level of academic performance demanded of them are sufficient to deliver public benefits anywhere near equivalent to the(...)

For many years, Jewish Vocational Service of Greater Boston was a small agency that helped Jewish immigrants find jobs. The organization was founded in 1938 to accommodate the influx of Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe. In 1981, it had about 10 employees and a budget of roughly $200,000. That was the year the agency hired(...)